Now that the birther movement is fading away, you'd be forgiven for imagining that the inventors of wacky anti-Obama conspiracy theories might be in retreat, regrouping, holding blue-sky out-of-the-box brainstorming sessions in secret, the better to perfect their next big scheme. But you'd be wrong. Obama-related conspiracy theories – like the UN's sharia-spreading communist helicopters – are hovering everywhere, just out of sight. Stay up to date with this concise guide:

The unexplained wedding-ring

The charge: While still a college student, and before becoming engaged to Michelle, Barack Obama was secretly married. Nobody knows to whom, but that's because it was a secret marriage. You see?

The evidence: In photos taken at the time – some of which were hiding in plain sight, having been published in Time in 2008 – Obama can be seen wearing a ring on his ring finger. And a Columbia student publication, dated 1990, the year before Barack proposed, joked about the mysterious ring. Stalwart Obama conspiracy theorist Jerome Corsi spends a significant proportion of his investigation showing, furthermore, that Obama's father didn't wear a wedding ring. Telling!

Bustgate

The charge: Obama's antipathy to the United Kingdom and to Anglo-Saxon leadership is so great that he rudely rejected the idea of keeping a bust of Winston Churchill in the White House, instead returning it to the British embassy. Mitt Romney has promised to welcome it back.

The evidence: Everyone agrees that Obama returned a Churchill bust that had been loaned by the embassy for the duration of the Bush administration. Everyone also agrees that there's a similar Churchill bust in the White House, right now, outside the Treaty Room. Idiotically, however, White House spokesman Dan Pfeiffer didn't mention the returned bust when he addressed the controversy on the White House blog on Friday. Pfeiffer's clunky attempt at spin gave chief bust-botherer Charles Krauthammer the opportunity he required. Was it "an honest mistake on ­Pfeiffer's part? Or was it deliberate deception? I have no idea," he wondered archly. What does Obama have to hide?

Hold on a second… There are two especially baffling aspects to this controversy. The first, as mentioned, is that there's a bust of Winston Churchill in the White House. (Pfeiffer even implies that the second bust was only ever brought in because the first was being worked on, though his post is borderline indecipherable.) The second is that the British embassy bust – you're following, right? – has been replaced in the Oval Office by a bust of Abraham Lincoln, an impeccable American icon with whom Obama's critics shouldn't have many problems. Krauthammer seems to be implying that any truly Atlanticist president would have two Churchill busts. Obviously.

Nancy Pelosi's secret

The charge: Nancy Pelosi, the Democratic House minority leader, isn't entitled to hold federal office, and the Democrats' entire congressional operation is therefore based on a terrible lie.

The evidence: A lawsuit filed by an Alaskan man, as reported by the Associated Press, contends that Pelosi is not entitled to hold federal office because, as a woman, she has no inherent right to be a US citizen.

Hold on a second… Um, yeah.

Obama's plan to ban guns

The charge: Obama plans to ban guns in America, and talked openly about during his pre-political career.

Hold on a second… Unfortunately, the source of the Obama quote isn't exactly neutral. He's John Lott, an energetic gun-rights campaigner and author of the books More Guns, Less Crime, Straight Shooting, and The Bias Against Guns: Why Almost Everything You've Heard About Gun Control Is Wrong. The chief evidence for the "secret plan", meanwhile, is that the head of the organisation Gun Owners of America "says there is no doubt" that he has such a plan. The same man also says that he "can see [Obama] telling gun stores... 'you can't sell rifles [that use large magazines] or I'm pulling your license." So the secret plan to ban guns a) exists only in a gun activist's mind, and b) even in that imaginary form, isn't actually a plan to ban guns.

Well done, everybody!

UPDATE: John Lott has asked me to clarify that the Obama comment he reports isn't the only evidence of his argument about the president's position on guns, and points to his articles here and here. I'm happy to pass them along.